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Subject: Biblical Hebrew Forum
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- From: George Athas <George.Athas AT moore.edu.au>
- To: "b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org" <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
- Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect
- Date: Tue, 28 May 2013 20:50:47 +0000
Karl,
My definition of aspect is as I said it: it is how an action is presented to the reader. It doesn't have to do with the nature of the action, but rather how it should be viewed. It seems to me you're attaching aspect to the nature of the action, which
is actually Aktionsart, not aspect.
Your claim about the lack of change in aspect between the qatal and yiqtol in Prov 31 makes little sense to me. The text uses different verbs, and therefore there is a change, like it or not. The question is what the nature of this change is. Since you're
actually thinking of Aktionsart, rather than aspect, you see no change because the nature of the actions does not appear to change. I could agree with that. But as I said, this is not aspect, which is a different view of the action. To claim there is no change
in aspect is to say that the text does not use different verb forms—in essence, it's a denial of the data. What you make of the data, is a different issue. As I mentioned, my view is that it has to do with definiteness, proximity, and complexity.
The prior question, therefore, is whether Hebrew verbs are marked for Aktionsart or aspect, or even both. I would argue for aspect as having greater explanatory power.
Cheers!
GEORGE ATHAS
Dean of Research,
Moore Theological College (moore.edu.au)
Sydney, Australia
From: K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>
Date: Wednesday, 29 May 2013 6:11 AM To: George Athas <george.athas AT moore.edu.au> Cc: B-Hebrew <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org> Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect George:
On Tue, May 28, 2013 at 3:26 AM, George Athas
<George.Athas AT moore.edu.au> wrote:
I never considered aspect and definiteness/indefiniteness to be the same, which is why I listed them separately. However, it looks as if you’re right that definiteness/indefiniteness doesn’t refer to verbs.
I just learned that Ruth is a member of SIL, so we should ask her what term is used to indicate whether a grammaticalization or syntactical construct refers to an action that definitely will, is, has happened as opposed to another indefinite action
that should, might happen?
Yes, and that’s also the SIL definition.
What is your definition of “aspect”? Rolf mentioned that there are more than 20 definitions for the term, so that could be a reason I often have trouble understanding what people are saying on this forum.
Even this doesn’t describe the uses of Qatal and Yiqtol in Proverbs 31:10–31. In this passage, to use the camera zoom analogy, both Qatal and Yiqtol are presenting actions at the same focal length and at the same distance.
I don’t see the different angle brought about by the grammaticalization.
To my surprise, I just looked up “indicative” on the SIL site, and it’s missing. Not there. Yet it’s listed in standard dictionaries as being a linguistic term referring to a mood, modality. In what follows, I’ll call it “simple action”.
I don’t see your pattern at all. All four of your conjugations are used for simple action—definite simple action and indefinite simple action. I don’t see how proximity fits in here at all. I need to see examples, probably many of them, before
this pattern gets through my denseness.
One pattern that seems to contradict your model is simple action, present referent (simple action happening at the time of the utterance) conversation preserved in Tanakh—the default pattern appears to be subject (noun/pronoun/pronominal suffix),
verb in Qatal, object (optional). A negation precedes the verb and often displaces a stand alone pronoun preceding the verb. The subject can be a person, object, or an action in the form of a participle.
Where the speaker wants to express other than simple action, such as subjunctive (should), intent, possibility, and some others, then a Yiqtol conjugation is used instead of a Qatal.
These patterns seem to contradict your model, big time.
I claim there seems to be a fuzzy line between when to use a Qatal and when a Yiqtol. Where a use can be near or on that fuzzy line, the writer makes a judgment call. In poetry, that judgment call can be for reasons of poetic license.
Karl W. Randolph.
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Re: [b-hebrew] to rolf
, (continued)
- Re: [b-hebrew] to rolf, K Randolph, 05/27/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] to rolf, Ruth Mathys, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] to rolf, Rolf, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] to rolf, George Athas, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] to rolf, K Randolph, 05/28/2013
- [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, George Athas, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, Peter Streitenberger, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, Barry, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, George Athas, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, K Randolph, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, George Athas, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, K Randolph, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, Ruth Mathys, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, Ken Penner, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, George Athas, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, Dave Washburn, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, George Athas, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, George Athas, 05/28/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, K Randolph, 05/29/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, George Athas, 05/29/2013
- Re: [b-hebrew] Verbal Aspect, K Randolph, 05/29/2013
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